1. Field
Apparatuses and methods consistent with exemplary embodiments relate to an image scanning apparatus and method, and more particularly, to an image scanning apparatus and method capable of scanning a shading patch during moving to scan a manuscript.
2. Description of the Related Art
Image scanning apparatuses are an apparatus which scans an original image of documents, pictures, films, or the like and converts the scanned original image into digital data. The digital data may be displayed on a monitor of a computer or printed by a printer, thereby being created as an output image. As an example of the image scanning apparatus, there are scanners, copiers, facsimiles, and multifunction peripherals (MFPs) configured to implement functions of the scanners, the copiers, and the facsimiles multiply through one apparatus.
In the general image scanning apparatus, distortion is caused in an image signal generated in an image sensor due to deviation or unbalance in an amount of light generated in a light source module. The phenomenon is referred to as a shading phenomenon. An image signal which is a different type from an actual manuscript to be printed may be generated due to the shading phenomenon. Therefore, the image scanning apparatuses need to correct the shading phenomenon representing the image signal.
Thereby, the image scanning apparatus of the related art performs a shading correction using a shading patch (or a white reference sheet) provided in one side of a flatbed. Hereinafter, the shading correction operation of the related art will be described with reference to FIG. 7.
FIG. 7 is a view illustrating the shading correction method in the related art.
Referring to FIG. 7, first, when a scan command is received from a user, it is determined whether or not a shading correction is required currently. When it is determined that the shading correction is required, an image sensor 50 moves to a shading patch region to scan a shading patch 20 provided in one side of a flatbed and performs a scanning operation on the shading patch 20. When the scanning operation on the shading patch is completed, the image sensor 50 generates reference shading data using scan data for the shading patch and moves to a home region 10.
When the reference shading data is generated using the scan data for the shading patch, the image sensor 50 moves to a manuscript region 30 in which a manuscript is placed to scan the manuscript, performs an scanning operation on the manuscript, and performs a shading correction on the scan data for the manuscript using the previously generated reference shading data.
In the related art, a moving operation of the image sensor is ineffective in that movement of the image sensor for generating the reference shading data and movement of the image sensor for scanning the manuscript are performed dualistically. More specifically, since the image sensor moves to the home region after the shading operation and then moves from the home region to the manuscript region again, the scanning operation when the shading correction is required takes a long time.
Since it takes a long time to generate the reference shading data for the shading correction, the image scanning apparatus in the related art generates the reference shading data on a set time interval and performs the shading correction using the previously generated reference shading data. However, since deviation or unbalance in an amount of light generated from the light source module becomes different every scanning operation, it is preferable that the process of generating the reference shading data be performed for each scanning operation.
However, in the related art, as described above, since the process of generating the reference shading data is not performed for each scanning operation, it is impossible to provide the same quality for every scan image.